


part the sand from the sea

by exalted_one



Series: one i love, two he loves [1]
Category: Captive Prince - C. S. Pacat
Genre: Blacksmith Damen, But when is that new?, Damen is in Danger, Demigod Damen, Demigods, M/M, Mermaids, Merman Laurent, gratuitous use of gods and goddesses
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2020-01-08
Updated: 2020-01-09
Packaged: 2021-02-27 08:08:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 4
Words: 20,495
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22113886
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/exalted_one/pseuds/exalted_one
Summary: “Hello?” he calls and the singing abruptly stops, the last cut-off note echoing off the rocks around him before they too fade into nothing. “Are you alright?” he tentatively calls, his voice thick, and receives nothing in answer but the sorrowful tune still rings in his ears. He sighs, looking away from the cliff side and down at his one submerged foot. He swings it from side to side in small figure eight motions, watching as the waves distort the shape of his foot and the fit of his sandal.“I know how you feel.” He says quietly to the sea air, wiping his tears away with the heel of his palm.“Do you?” A voice asks back and he startles so badly he loses his balance and falls off the boulder he’s been sitting on and into the ocean. When his head breeches the water it’s to the sound of laughter echoing off the cliffs around them – and to the sight of glittering blue eyes. “I apologize for startling you.”Gills, webbed and pointed ears. The haunting singing from before. A tail.“You… You’re--” He can’t make himself say it. It’s impossible. Isn’t it?“A Veretian?” The man says, his speaking voice just as melodic as his singing voice.
Relationships: Damen/Laurent (Captive Prince)
Series: one i love, two he loves [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1592926
Comments: 21
Kudos: 69
Collections: Captive Prince Reverse Bang 2019





	1. when i touch the water

**Author's Note:**

> i'm absolute shit at descriptions, so like. the summary of this story will probably change.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is my piece for the Captive Prince (Reverse) Big Bang this year, I was lucky enough to get my first pick of art pieces, which just happened to be diamythal's prompt of Merman Laurent and this whole story sprouted from there. 
> 
> You can see their lovely art [[here]](https://diamythal.tumblr.com/post/190143014131/here-is-my-entry-for-the-captive-prince-big-bang)

_~_

_there will come a soldier_ _  
__who carries a mighty sword_ _  
__he will tear your city down, o lei o lai o lord_ _  
__o lei, o lai, oh lei, o lord_

 _he will tear your city down,_ _  
__oh lei o lai o lord_

_~_

_"This way, Exalted!” A voice whispers desperately into the darkness. The world is pitched in deep shadows, the moon glowing as red as blood and bathing everything in its terrifying color. Two figures flutter between tall marble balustrades, pausing to duck into darkness as a team of guards march down the hallway they’ve just come from with swords glinting a menacing red held ready in their hands._

_The two lone shadows race across the quiet palace, feeling the tall marble building with stark white cloth billowing behind their figures in their haste. They run with bare feet across the empty courtyard and into the darkness of the stables. They halt in their entrance, stumbling into discovery by a single guard. The smaller of the figures doesn’t hesitate before leaping in from of the other, physically shielding them with their body from the guard. But the guard lifts an empty hand with his palm towards them._

_“Easy, Helen, I’m not going to hurt you.”_

_Her chin tilts up defiantly, her short brown curls peeking out from under a riding cloak, assessing the man in front of her. Her light hazel eyes are bathed a dark, bloody brown in the moonlight._

_“And yet your men are storming the palace, swords in hand, to kill their queen on a night cursed by the gods.” She spits, her hands shaking with adrenaline and fear but she doesn’t back down._

_The guard shakes his head, clearly upset. “I didn’t give them these orders, Helen; please you have to believe me. My family has protected the royal family for generations. I could never—I wouldn’t...” He cuts himself off, his voice thick with shock. “The king has gone insane. He, he woke up from a deep sleep and it was like he was in a frenzy. He gave the orders for Egeria-Exalted’s execution, as well as the babe’s, and immediately the sky went dark. I knew you’d be running, and that you’d have to head here first. I ordered them to look somewhere else first; I told them you’d try to escape through the slave passages. I readied the horses, I’m coming with you.”_

_The figure still shrouded in darkness steps up beside Helen, a bundle of cloth held tightly in her arms._

_“I can’t ask this of you, Stavos. If they find out you’ve helped me they’ll kill you for treason.”_

_Stavos looks down into the eyes of his queen, of his friend. Of the girl he grew up with trailing after him like a determined little sister and he shook his head._

_“You know where I stand, Exalted. I will not serve a false king and forsake you in the process. You are the rightful Queen. You have the blood of our gods inside you. I swore to protect you with my life and I will not go back on my word. I would sooner die than take orders from the pretender on the throne.” He affirmed, his voice quiet and solemn as he looked at Egeria and her handmaiden Helen, both clad in hastily acquired cloaks and barefoot to make a soundless escape from the marble halls._

_A shout erupts from outside the stables and Stavos stalks forward, between the two women and further so he’s standing between them and the doors to the stables should anyone come in._

_“Quickly! If we run through the back streets we should be out of Ios before they’ve even saddled their horses. I’ve sliced all the cinches I could find to give us some time.”_

_Stavos and Helen both help Egeria onto her horse, Helen holding the bundle from her arms while she gets seated before handing it back up to her. Egeria takes the bundle with one arm, cradling it tightly to her chest while she wraps the reins tightly around her other wrist. She turns to look at her companions, the Captain of her guard and her closest friend, and her most trusted handmaiden, as they climb nimbly atop their own rides. They share a loaded look before Egeria nods, the hood of her cloak falling back and revealing a circlet of golden laurels nested in her curls. With a single command her horse rears back, kicking the stable door open with a bang, and all three horses take off at a run across the dirt of the courtyard._

_A sentry lets loose a cry of warning but it falls on the palace ears too late as three cloaked figures flee out into the streets and disappear into the darkness of the unlit night._

_The three riders race north across the countryside, never daring to look back. They ride well into the night, going as strong and as fast as they are able until the horses start to wane. They make it impossibly across province after province in the dead of the night, the moon still a dark foreboding red to guide them. Through Kesus, across Mellos, over Sicyon and well into Delfeur they fly with no sign of the morning sun in sight. But as they go to pass Delfeur into Arran they are met with emptiness._

_Nothing._

_There is nothing where Arran should be and nothing as far as the eye can see that would indicate the rest of the country that should be north of Delfeur. It it just sea as far back as the sky reaches, tumultuous and turbulent sea raging a deep blood red under an angry moon._

“Impossible.” _Stavos gasps as they pull their horses to an abrupt halt._

_“This night has been cursed by the gods.” Helen mutters, turning to look at Egeria just in time to see her list to one side and fall from the saddle. “Exalted!”_

_Stavos and Helen quickly dismount, rushing to her aid and helping to prop her into a sitting position. She still holds the bundle in her arms tightly, but she reaches up with one hand to pull the laurels from her hair. She looks up at her two countrymen, her two most loyal followers, her face deathly pale and the laurels shaking in her hand. The ride has been hard on them all, but hardest on her the most and it shows._

_“Please… Keep him… Keep him safe.” She whispers, her breathing labored, and Helen shakes her head with wide eyes._

_“Exalted, what—“_

_“I can’t… I won’t…” Her lips crack into a faint grin. “I was never supposed to get pregnant in the first place. I was never meant to survive it. The gods granted me this favor but every favor has a price. The physicians knew I wasn’t going to make it longer than a few days after—after I had him. And then Theomedes—I knew I had to get him away from there. As far as I possibly could. Hennike would have kept him safe, helped him grow until he could take back his home but Vere isn’t here and now… Now I have done all I could do. It’s up to you.”_

_Egeria turns her warm, brown eyes up to the captain of her guard._

_“I know it is an impossible task to ask of you—“_

_“Anything, Exalted. I would do_ anything _for you.” He interrupts, kneeling at her side and she drops the laurels to reach a hand up and cup his rough cheek, her eyes filling with tears._

_“You swore an oath to protect the proper line of Akielos, Captain.” She warns and he nods._

_“And I intent to keep that oath. I’ll keep him safe, Exalted.”_

_“I think… I think we can dispense with the titles for now.” She says breathily and Stavos feels his own eyes begin to water. His hands shake as he helps hold her up._

_“I’m so sorry, Egeria.” He starts and she shakes her head before leaning and gently knocking their foreheads together like they used to do when they were children._

_“The night may be cursed by the gods but this? This is my price. My price for my darling little prince and I would pay it a thousand times over.” She says softly, looking down in her lap and bringing her free hand up to slowly peel away the cloth to uncover the surprisingly quiet babe._

_A small round face turns curiously into the fresh air, little eyes opening to look up at the face of his mother above him. Egeria smiles down at him, brushing a single finger along a down-soft cheek._

_“He is the lion. He will save Akielos.” She whispers and Helen chances a glance over at Stavos to see him looking desperately at Egeria, tears streaming silently down his face and his bright grey eyes shining as Egeria lifts the babe and holds him out towards her guard._

_Stavos takes him with a shaking hand, his other still helping to hold Egeria up even as she slumps further and further into his chest._

_“And what is his name, Exalted?” Helen whispers back and Egeria doesn’t look away from the babe in Stavos’ arms, even as her eyes start to drift closed._

“Damianos.” 

~

Damen wakes with a gasp, his heart hammering in his chest. He chances a flickering glance around his small room and sees no discernible cause to his sudden wakefulness. When he looks to the window he can see the sky just barely starting to lighten with the coming sun. He sighs, running shaking hands up his face as he sits up and reaches out to grab a chiton and its pins. He slips it on easily enough, his hands automatically working to twist the fabric and pin it into place while his minds works fruitlessly to try and remember the dream he’d been having.

All he can remember is everything bathed in a deep red, like blood, and a desperate sense of urgency.

He brings his hands up to rub at his eyes again, his eyes watering on a yawn, and a small chirp captures his attention. Sitting in his windowsill is a small sparrow.

Damen blinks, his heart slowing down and a sense of calm coming over him as he watches the little sparrow as it hops along the sill, looking up at him frequently. It tilts its head to one side as if considering him before chirping once more and flying off

He turns away from the window to locate his sandals, lacing them up as he prepares for the day ahead. The dream slips away from him like a petal in the wind. Barely a trace of its fragrance left before it too is gone and all that’s left is the wind.

~

“It’s a fine piece of craftsmanship. One of the finest I’ve seen.” There’s a pause and the faint clink of metal being placed gently down on wood. “Are you certain there’s no way for me to meet its maker? I’d prefer to speak with them myself before making a purchase, either way.” The voice is strong, their accent thick around the vowels in the way of most people from Ios. There’s a cadence to the tone that Damen can easily identify as someone from a better-off family; language and grammar lessons being the most likely culprit. This man is someone quite important and most likely quite powerful. He’s clearly not used to not getting his way.

“I’m sorry, Captain, but as I said before. The smith who worked on this particular piece is usually busy with commissions all over and around Marlas. He’s not in the shop at the moment, and probably won’t be for the next few days. The harvest season is closing in and everyone’s trying to get a head start on getting multiple tools repaired and their horses shoed.”

Damen keeps his breathing steady, leaning against one of the stone walls hidden from the front of the shop by a large cabinet – stocked with the tools of the few smiths who use this particular smithy as their main point of operation. Aegeus owns the shop itself and usually takes a cut of whatever each smith makes as payment for their use of the smithy. He’s a rather fair old man, and every person who works for him or around him treats him like a fatherly figure. Even Damen.

Aegeus is one of the most patient men that Damen knows. He’s heard Aegeus listen to irate customers and angry merchants enough times through the years to know that nearly nothing can faze the old man.

“And there’s only the one smith available who works locally? Other than you?” This captain is rather persistent. He’s been talking to Aegeus for the past hour, Damen’s been listening in the entire while.

“There’s only one young enough to get around that well. He’s quite popular. And quite handy, a regular jack of all trades sort and in a town as small as this any extra jobs you can take on can be the difference between living on the street and living with a roof over your head. He’s got family to take care of, of course he’s busy.”

The man makes a noise of begrudging acknowledgement.

“I understand the position of working men better than most. I only wish I’d been able to meet with the smith myself. Is there really no time that he’ll be here in the next few days? I’m here on the kings orders for at least a week.”

“I’m not sure what the king thinks he’s going to find this far north. We don’t generally get any trouble. We’re too far west for any border skirmishes or raids from Vask or Patras.” Aegeus muses and Damen frowns to himself. This is the third troop of men who’ve come this far north in the past few months. All of them have stayed a week before departing. No one’s been able to figure out why they’re here or what they want.

“No. There hasn’t been any unrest on either border, anyways. It’s just a routine tour. We’ve been travelling for weeks, getting a general feel for how the smaller cities are fairing in this declining weather.”

“The drought, you mean. Wasn’t aware the king was keeping so close track of it.”

“The king is always keeping an eye on his country and anything that could threaten his people.” The man answers shortly, clearly done with Aegeus’ questions and subtle insults.

“I’m not sure how the king is going to fight the weather, but gods be with him when he does. If I see the Lamen before you’ve departed Marlas I’ll let him know you were looking for him, Captain.”

It’s a clear dismissal if Damen’s ever heard one. And a rather abrupt one for someone with Aegeus’ level of patience. The use of Damen’s fake name is not lost on him; he stays hidden away and doesn’t move.

“We’re staying at---“

“You’re the only visitors in town. I reckon the entire village knows where you’re staying, Captain.”

Damen’s eyebrows rise of their own accord, shock sprawled across his face. Aegeus never interrupts people – especially not officers who’re looking to buy product from his shop. But the captain clearly takes the words for what they are, a dismissal not an insult, and Damen can hear the creak of leather as he shifts into what Damen assumes to be a short bow.

“Of course, living in a village as small as Marlas word must spread rather fast. Perhaps your smith will hear I’m looking for him. I wish you a pleasant evening, sir.” There’s a moment of silence as Aegeus must dip his head in acceptance and proper response to the bow. Despite the Captain being of higher rank, Aegeus is clearly an elder to him and as such is treated like any councilman of the king would be treated.

“Even if he doesn’t hear it from someone else, I’ll make sure to pass the message along. Thank you for stopping in, I’m sorry we couldn’t help you with everything you were looking for.”

Damen doesn’t hear anything after that except footsteps and the faint muffled sounds of a goodbye as the Captain leaves out the front door, the hinges creaking as the door swings shut behind him. He stays leaning against the wall, hidden in the shadows, for a moment longer just to be sure the man has left before he turns and walks deeper into the shop.

He makes a beeline through the cluttered edges of the many workstations hidden in the back, larger, portion of Aegeus’ shop. Right at the very back are the oldest ovens, the original ones Aegeus started the smithy with. As it’s grown he’s had more made, a few along each wall as the shop also grew in size. There’s one workspace right in the heart of the chaotic mess and that’s where Damen’s headed.

Since he started as an apprentice he’s had the same desk in Aegeus’ smithy. Even as he grew up and outgrew his apprentice position with advanced pieces of metalwork, he’s always stayed at that desk. Other smiths have come and gone, and still Damen is at this station. It’s the closest to the old ovens and as such is the one that gets the hottest, or so he’s been told. Truth is, Damen hardly feels the extreme heat of the ovens and he’s hardly affected by the smoke that comes from them either (when it’s a particularly overcast or rainy day the chimneys can get clogged and therefore not keep the smoke out of the shop the way they should).

Aegeus has called it a god-granted gift, along with his talent for metalwork. And perhaps when he was younger Damen took pride in the words. That he was working so hard and so well that people were comparing him to any of the gods was definitely a confidence booster. But as he’s gotten older he doesn’t find the same appreciation for the words. It’s _his_ hands and _his_ body and _his_ mind that is making all his swords and tools and other creations. It’s him who’s creating the seemingly impossible from even the toughest of metals. Why give credit to the gods when _he’s_ the one physically making these things. They’re not gifts, they’re skills he worked hard to perfect and maintain.

He’s already cleaned his workspace for the day. His commission sketches are stacked in a neat and orderly pile in order of when he’s got to have each project completed, all his tools have been put away and he doesn’t have any stray, half-finished pieces lying about. He’s easily the most tidy of any of the other smiths currently working here. He idly flips through the corners of his sketches as he listens to Aegeus walk down the hallway from the front and lean against the door frame that leads into the entire work area.

He doesn’t say anything but Damen can feel his eyes on him and he sighs. “He was quite insistent.” He says, keeping his eyes on his hands and feeling his stomach tighten with familiar guilt.

“They always are. Don’t know why they can’t take a hint.” Damen chances a look up at the older man.

“I don’t—Why don’t you just let them see me? Why do you keep telling them to go away and that I’m not here? You’ve done it for years now, aren’t you sick of it?”

“Sick of protecting you? Keeping you safe? No. Damen you’re family, I’ll never get tired of keeping you safe.”

“We’re not technically family, Aegeus. And everyone else who works here gets to sell their pieces directly to their customers. Why is it I’ve never been allowed to do the same?”

Aegeus gives him an unimpressed look, pushing off from the door frame to walk towards him. It’s quiet in the shop at the moment, all the fires burnt down to quiet embers for the night, and his footsteps are easy to hear on the hard packed dirt floor. “Kid, I’ve been watching you since you were small enough to fit in my hands. You’re family whether you like it or not. And as for the rest of it… It’s not my place to tell you.” Damen opens his mouth in protest but Aegeus holds up a hand to stop him. “It’s really not. I don’t know the whole story myself. Your aunt and uncle have only told me what they can. If you want the truth, the whole truth, you’re going to have to ask them yourself.”

Damen groans, letting his head fall back in familiar frustration; he’s quite used to that excuse whenever he brings up the differences in how he’s treated versus how others are treated. No one wants to tell him, they always tell him to ask later. Or say that they’ll tell him when he’s older. When he brings his head back up it’s to see Aegeus watching him, considering.

“Ask your uncle.”

“I’ve done that a million times his answer is always the same.” Damen protests halfheartedly, following as Aegeus turns around and goes back to the front of the shop.

“You’re twenty-six now, Damen. Ask him again. Ask him for truth – the entirety of it. You’re old enough to understand things better now.”

Damen doesn’t answer, choosing instead to let out an exasperated sigh as he unties the thick leather apron and hangs it up on the hooks near the door. Aegeus is doing the same, taking a well-worn himation down from the hooks and folding it around his form. He pins it over his chiton before slipping his feet from the thick, protective leather boots they wear and back into his regular sandals. Damen slips on his own himation, draping it around his body and pinning it artfully in place. He’s left enough loose fabric around his back that he can pull it up and make it into a hood. His aunt Helen always makes him wear it like that when there are strangers in Marlas.

“I’d say were done for the day, I sent the other lads home earlier. Don’t bother coming in tomorrow, the shop won’t be open. I’m getting too old to try and be working the solstice days.” Aegeus says lightly and Damen chances a look at Aegeus’ well-built form. Metal-smithing is not an easy job, and despite his age Aegeus looks like he could easily fight off three men younger than him. He raises a disbelieving brow at the older man and receives a mischievous grin in return. “Am I not allowed to have a day off for drinking, Damen?”

Damen laughs as he hooks his fingers into the folds of himation behind his neck, pulling it up so it covers his face if anyone chances a glance at him from the side.

“Please, you hate drinking. After that commander made you drink that griva you’ve refused to touch a single drop.” He teases and Aegeus playfully shudders next to him.

“If you’ve tried any of that god-forsaken drink you’d understand. No. Penelope wants to go down to the beaches and give our oblations. We usually stay at home, start a fire in the yard and make our offerings then but she says she was given a sign, so to the beaches we go.” Aegeus opens the door as he’s speaking, looking out with sharp eyes before motioning for Damen to go ahead. He’s about to turn down the street that’ll take him home when a hand lands on his arm, stopping him. He turns to cast a curious look at Aegeus who’s looking at him with a deadly sort of seriousness settled into his expression.

“Be careful with these men in the city, Damen. Try and lay low as much as you’re able while they’re in town. Stay out of trouble. I don’t want to have to hire a new smith so close to harvest season.”

Damen nods along, holding his hands up in surrender. It’s pointless to try and argue with the old man when he gets like this. He latches onto the joke at the end easily. “As if you’d be able to find someone as good as me.” He scoffs and Aegeus’ lips twitch up in the corners but his eyes still stay serious, he lifts his hand from Damen’s arm and nods in clear goodbye.

“Remember what I told you. Ask Stavos for the truth. I’ll see you after the solstice.” 

“Yeah, yeah old man. I won’t forget.”

With that he watches as Aegeus marches down the road, deeper into town than Damen has to go. He lives on the other side of Marlas with his wife, Penelope, and their youngest child. All around him on the street are signs of the upcoming solstice. Decorations and temporary merchant stalls have bloomed out of nowhere like summer lilies – there for a fleeting fragrant moment and then gone for the rest of the year. He looks to his right, keeping an eye out for the familiar leather and red chlamys’ of the king’s personal troops, before turning to his left and ducking down a well-worn path. It’s hidden entirely in back alleys and full of confusing detours. Helen and Stavos insist he takes it to get to and from work when there are strangers in town which, he thinks, is another thing to ask them about.

It had taken him a good few months to learn the path, and a few weeks more to be able to successfully navigate it himself when he was just starting to work as an apprentice under Aegeus. Now he doesn’t even need to think about how many turns there are or what direction he’s going. Even in the pitch black, moonless nights he could likely navigate the trail blindfolded.

He only has to duck back into an alley once, a flash of bright red livery catching his eye for a second. When he peeks back around the corner to check he doesn’t see the distinctive red anywhere, but he rushes the rest of the way home just in case – keeping a careful eye over his shoulder for a potential follower. Even as he reaches the edge of town where he keeps his horse at a local stable, he can’t shake the feeling that for all he can’t see them – someone is watching him.

It doesn’t take long for him to make it home, or at least to the small cottage a few miles out of Marlas that he calls home. Damen’s not sure when it was built, or who by, but he’s been living in this cottage his entire life so far and it’s always seemed to be one good wind away from being just a pile of sticks. Some days it seems like he, his aunt Helen and his uncle Stavos are practically piled on top of each other for how small the space is. It was never built for three full grown people to be living in – but it’s all his aunt and uncle could afford when they came north. Damen’s been saving in secret though, mainly from his commission pieces, to buy the two of them a house in the town proper.

However when he gets there it’s to find neither Helen nor Stavos are home. Helen is one of the few local midwives, and Damen knows she’s got a woman who’s quite close to having a child so that’s where she most likely is. Stavos is harder to pin down. Some days he’s helping people build or fix their homes or barns or other buildings, and sometimes he’s helping local farmers with a multitude of tasks. But Damen knows he’ll see both of them for supper tonight. When the solstices’ come around Helen insists they go out to eat at the large local tavern in the center of the town. The night before, the night of and the night after the solstice they make the trek into town to eat and talk and be around the other locals.

In the meantime Damen lets his horse loose in their small pasture, full of thick green grass and freckles of color from the late spring wildflowers blown in on the winter-warming winds of the past season. He spends the rest of his afternoon tidying up the house and doing some small repairs that have been left for a day when someone has the proper time to fix them.

Helen makes it home when he’s halfway through his mental list of repair projects, and he can tell the moment she gets back because the few stray dogs that have decided to call their small patch of land home bark excitedly and go running towards the road. She stays off to the side, standing safely on the ground and watching as he putters around on top of the cottage fixing the few holes they’d discovered the last time it had rained, which had been months and months ago. It’s easy work and it doesn’t take long before he’s clambering down to the ground to greet her.

“I’m guessing Aegeus let you off early for the festival?” She says as he leans down to kiss her cheek, she reaches a hand up to cup his cheek and he smiles down at her.

“That’s part of it. He sent everyone else off while I was finishing up a piece, I didn’t even notice. But when I got up to go ask I could hear him talking to someone. The king’s sent another troop up.” A flicker of something passes over Helen’s face but before Damen can identify it it’s gone and her normal warm smile is back. She motions towards the cottage and he follows as she heads inside.

“I’m guessing the man Aegeus was talking to was part of that troop?” Her voice is light but Damen can hear an underlying unsteadiness beneath it.

“He was the captain, actually. He was looking at one of my swords I’ve got out on display. He wanted to talk to me but Aegeus kept him busy until he could dismiss him properly.” He can’t see her face but he can see her nod tersely as she takes off her regular riding cloak and goes in search of the one she wears for special occasions.

“Good man.” She comments and Damen’s face crumples in considering confusion.

“About that, _theítsa_. Aegeus, he… he said to ask you for the truth.” Helen’s head turns at the pet name, he hardly uses it now. He used to use it lots when he was younger, calling her auntie all the time but as he grew older he could see how uncomfortable it made her. How it would startle her. He usually uses it when he’s trying to push at the motherly feelings she clearly has for him. She turns around completely as he trails off, he’s asked the question so many times and been told countless more that he’ll find out when he’s older but now. Now he doesn’t know what he’ll do if she and Stavos still refuse to tell him what they’ve been hiding.

He can’t help but hunch in on himself as he takes a seat at their small kitchen table, twisting his hands together nervously and keeping his eyes on them. He swallows and the taste of apprehension is thick in the back of his throat.

“I asked why he kept doing that, sending people away when they ask about my work. Or more specifically when they ask to meet me or talk to me. All my commission pieces come from outside orders for people I’ve never even seen. The others at the shop they—they take their commissions face to face. They talk to their potential customers. They get to talk about how they made something or the difficulties in finishing a piece but how proud they are of it. I’ve never… I’m never allowed to do that. And I—Well I asked Aegeus why. It’s been bothering me for ages but I remember asking when I was younger and he just insisted that this was how things had to be. For. For my protection.” He chances a glance away from his hands and towards Helen to see her looking down at him with a soft but concerned expression. Her arms are crossed over herself but her hands keep moving as if she wants to drop them and reach out.

“I remember when I came to you when I was younger. When the other kids would make fun of me for not having parents and I asked you where they were and why they were gone. You told me there was stuff I needed to know but I couldn’t learn until I was ready. I—I don’t know when I’m going to be ready, but surely you can tell me something. Anything.”

He watches his auntie as she bites her lip consideringly, her eyes flicking about all over him as if taking note of all the differences in him now from the first time he’d asked. She sighs, dropping her arms and bringing a hand up to rub at her eyes and along her cheek worryingly.

“I… I agree with Aegeus, though the man can’t possibly understand what he’s encouraging you to do. You’ve already been quite patient with us, more patient than most would be. I imagine it’s quite frustrating to live with rules and not know why you’ve got them. We’ve just been trying to protect you.”

Damen feels a flash of exasperation at the words.

“Protect me from what?” His hands splay out, motioning to the small space around them. “ _Theítsa.”_

She reaches forward to grab one of his hands in both of hers before sitting down at the table beside him and looking down at their joined hands. Even with both of her hands she can’t cover all of his. The difference in size is a stark one and as he looks up towards her, where she’s studiously not looking back at him, he takes note of each freckle and wrinkle and grey hair he sees. She’s always been taking care of him. Since he was just a babe. He never noticed that she was growing older, that he was growing bigger and taller than she is. When did it happen, he wonders.

“I’ll talk to Stavos tonight. And tomorrow. Tomorrow we’ll tell you the truth.” She looks up at him, her hazel eyes just as sharp as they always have been.

~

Damen hunches lower in his seat, idly picking at his himation where it’s folded into the hood he usually has it in. Helen and Stavos are outside; he can see the outlines of them in the light of all the lanterns lit out along the streets from his mostly comfortable seat inside the tavern. They look to be having an argument.

“Water? Wine?” Damen blinks, coming back to himself and turning to look up at the voice interrupting his wordless worrying. The daughter of the woman who owns the tavern is standing beside his table, looking at him with a soft smile as she lifts a jug of wine.

“No, thank you. I’m fine for now.” She nods her head in a short bow before she looks up and follows the direction Damen had been looking for. She watches Helen and Stavos for a moment before reaching out and laying a gentle hand on his arm.

“It’ll be alright. Most couples their age can get into a right row when they’ve gotten started.” She says and Damen feels his lips twitch involuntarily. He’s seen his fair share of stupid fights between Helen and Stavos, he knows just how easily they can rile the other up when they’re bored or tired of living in each other’s pockets. This isn’t a fight like that, but he decides to humor the girl anyways. He doesn’t want to worry her over something he’s not even sure he should be worrying over.

“Don’t I know it.”

She smiles down at him, patting his arm once before pulling her hand away. “You know where to find me when they come inside. I’ll imagine they’re working up quite the appetites.” She jokes and Damen nods. He watches her weave away between the tables and head back into the kitchen just in time for the front doors to open and two unfamiliar figures to step inside, a cool spring breeze drifting in with them. Damen doesn’t think he’s seen then around before but Damen doesn’t actually see most of the people from in and around Marlas. He was never very popular when he was taking lessons in town as a child, always pushed away and kept apart from the others by some unspoken rule the children had made up. They don’t look like any local farm hands but perhaps they’re part of a passing merchant’s caravan. They’re not dressed in the oppressive leather and bright red of the King’s men, so Damen doesn’t feel he’s got to look away or hide like he might have had they been.

His eyes catch those of one of the men, the first one to have come in and he has just enough time to notice that the man’s eyes are a startling light grey that’s familiar. 

“Damen.” He jumps at the use of his name, turning away from the man and towards Stavos, who’s come back inside from one of the side doors with Helen a step behind him while Damen was distracted.

“Uncle.” He greets back but Stavos isn’t looking at him, instead looking over him and towards where Damen had been looking before. Damen can see his eyes tighten for a second, the corners of his mouth turning down in a faint frown before he seems to come back to himself and look back down at Damen.

Helen sits down across the table and Stavos sits down beside her. Damen tries not to feel like he’s about to get lectured on something he’s done wrong.

“Did you order us any wine?” Helen asks and Damen shakes his head, meeting her curious gaze.

“No… I. I wasn’t sure when you’d be coming back in so Sophia went back to the kitchens.”

“I’ll go order for us then.” Stavos says, standing back up and leaving before Damen can offer to do it for them. He gives Helen what he assumes is a troubled look and she smiles shakily back at him while she reaches out to pat at the hand that’s still picking at his himation.

“It’ll be alright. He’s just worried. Why don’t you tell me about those commission pieces you were talking about last week? How are they coming along?” She offers as a last ditch effort of distraction and he happily jumps on it. Anything to lighten the rather strange atmosphere he’s finding himself in.

Stavos makes it back to the table with a plate of soft buns and a jug of wine, their order placed and nothing further to do but wait. He accepts the current topic of conversation and even asks some questions of his own.

None of them notice the two soldiers, dressed down in more casual clothes, who’ve sat down at the table behind them. One of which has distinct light grey eyes who keeps sharing quiet glances with his companion. Neither of them speak. They eat their meals in silence, listening in as Damen quietly describes the few complicated metalwork pieces he’s been tasked with making. 


	2. they tell me i could be set free

_~_

_there will come a poet_ _  
_ _whose weapon is his word_ _  
_ _he will slay you with his tongue, o lei o lai o lord_ _  
_ _o lei, o lai, oh lei, o lord_

 _he will slay you with his tongue,_ _  
_ _o lei o lai o lord_

_~_

Nikandros is an incredibly capable man.

Experienced in a multitude of skills and situations he started his army training when he was just ten years old (five years earlier than most children start their training) and he rose to meet every challenge given to him along the way. At eighteen he was given the honor of serving at the kingsmeet, an honor granted to very few soldiers, and he served there for five incredible years. His reputation of dutiful service and skills were what got him noticed by one of the kings guards, who in turn got him noticed by the king. At twenty-three he started his service as a member of the royal guard and now, at thirty years old, he’s the Captain of one of the three main sections of the royal guard.

On one hand there is the King’s Guard, tasked with protecting the king wherever he is and serving as his day-to-day protection. They all live in a subsection of his household and there are always five directly available to the King at any given moment. On the other hand there is the Prince’s Guard who are tasked with protecting the prince and ensuring his safety in any and all situations – especially as the current and only prince is therefore the heir to the throne and the future king of Akielos. Then there is the Royal Guard, which is the one Nikandros is in charge of since an impossibly young age.

The Royal Guard, while also helping protect both the king and the prince, is actually the largest force of soldiers working directly under the king and not under any of the generals of the provinces. The Royal Guard does whatever the King needs them to do, whether that be stay in Ios and protect the King or Prince, or travel to other provinces or even countries on missions imperative to Akielos’ safety.

In the history of all the royal guards since the beginning of Akielos there has never been a man named Captain as young as Nikandros, except for one. His name was Stavos and he was the Captain of the King’s Guard back when it was known as the Queen’s Guard. He was named captain of the guard when he was just eighteen. That man was also Nikandros’ father. The last time Nikandros saw him was when he was just four years old, the day that the last Queen of Akielos was executed.

Nikandros fought against the reputation that left on his family. His father disappeared, disobeyed direct orders from the King of Akielos and helped the Queen escape, though she died later that night anyways. There had been rumors swirling for ages that the Queen and her Captain had had a romance on the side, which only made the reputation worse. Surely, people thought, he was made Captain because of the relationship he had with the Queen and not because of his own capabilities.

Nikandros had to fight tooth and nail for every commendation he received. Every promotion he gained was scrutinized. Everyone believed he had connections to the royal family in some way, or if he didn’t he was sure to gain some quickly. None of his achievements seemed to be reflective of him – always tainted by the mud of his father’s actions. It just made Nikandros work that much harder to prove himself. And it worked.

So while Nikandros may be a very capable man, and an incredibly determined and dutiful soldiers, he’s also a smart man. And as a smart man he knows when things don’t make sense. Like, for example, the fact that Kastor and Theomedes have spent the last five years sending him on a wild goose chase all across Akielos and it’s only gotten more frantic as the years have gone by.

At first it seemed to be an idle worry. Some loose ends from years ago that the Exalted would think on from time to time and ask his Guard and Council for advice about. But nothing ever came from it. Yet, as seasons passed this idle worry turned into an actual worry, and that worry had quickly turned into a fear. Theomedes-Exalted tried to hide it but Nikandros was no stranger to fear and found it easily recognizable. Besides, only a fool fears nothing and no one.

Nikandros and his men were sent far and wide, trekking across every province and checking over every city. Even taking rare trips into the border provinces of Patras on invitation from the King of Patras himself (who seemed keen to incite and maintain a peaceful relationship with Akielos ever since Vere fell to the gods). But they were never told what it was they were searching for. ‘A threat to the safety and integrity of all of Akielos’ the King would always claim, and Nikandros didn’t dare question the Exalted. Especially not with how hard he’d fought to prove he could be trusted and relied upon. And besides, as a countryman of Akielos wasn’t it his job to obey his king? To assist him in any way asked?

So he held his tongue and he marched all over Kesus, Thrace and Mellos. He travelled throughout Aegina and Dice. He stayed in Sicyon for months with the Exalted’s General of War, Makedon, who had not a single positive thing to say about his King. And now, in the last year he’s combed back and forth across Delpha multiple times.

And there is nothing.

No sign of this forbidding threat to the country of Akielos.

He’d tentatively asked, the last time they’d returned to Ios empty handed and tired from their confusing journey, if Theomedes-Exalted could give them any information. Any actual specifics as to what it was he was supposed to be looking for.

Apparently he’d caught Theomedes-Exalted in one of his frenetic fits of stressful fear and paranoia (which were becoming more and more common if the palace physicians following him around were to be believed).

Theomedes-Exalted had stared Nikandros down unblinkingly, his eyes wild and unfocused. But then after dismissing everyone but Nikandros and sending the meeting room into a tizzy of movement. In the silence that followed, he started pacing. And he started talking.

He relayed to Nikandros a dream he’d been having since long before Akielos lost her queen. Long before Theomedes-Exalted had had his son Kastor. Longer, even than Theomedes-Exalted had even met the late Queen of Akielos.

In the dream, or vision as the Exalted was insistent it be called, there was a man. A tall, well-built man, of formidable size who stood atop the steps at the entrance of the palace. A smiths hammer in one hand, and the Theomedes-Exalted’s scepter in the other. At first, the Exalted said, he had thought the palace and all of Ios to be burning in a great fire behind the man, but upon later dreams of the same vision he realized that the entire palace and city were not in fact burning but covered in burnished gold. It had looked to be on fire because the sun had been rising over the Aegean sea and the light had set the city of gold ablaze.

Past the glare of the city, in some of the visions, Theomedes-Exalted had enough time to chance a look closer towards the man. He noticed that from the courtyard, all the way up the marble steps to the top were covered in bodies. Bodies of men he hadn’t recognized at first, but through the years had grown to know and recognize. At the top of the steps, with arms outstretched in a desperate reach, were the bodies of Prince Kastor and Exalted himself.

Perched atop the man’s head, nestled into dark curls, was the recognizable form of Queen Egeria’s famous golden laurel crown.

Every vision ended the same. No matter when Theomedes-Exalted had seen it.

A dove flew down from the sky, circling the man at the top of the steps three times before settling on top of the scepter. It would fix the Exalted with its sharp gaze and its beak would open at the voice of a thousand men and women would come out – all speaking in unison.

“ _He is the Lion.”_ They would say. _“He will hold the center.”_

And then the dove would hop from the scepter to the giant man’s shoulder, rub its face along his jaw lovingly and then take off. It would always fly directly at the Exalted, rearing back at the last second to bring its clawed feet forwards and aimed at his eyes. Just before it could come into contact with him, Theomedes would wake up.

“It’s a message from the gods. A warning. This man will be the end of Ios. He controls the dove, and as such he controls peace. And he has clearly twisted it to attack. He _will_ bring war.” The Exalted would insist.

And so he’d sent Nikandros back to Delpha, the only province without a Kyros to rule it and guide it and therefore the best and easiest place to hide from the power of Ios. And this time Nik had an idea of what he was looking for.

And he’d found it.

Or well, he’d found _him_.

Every town they’d stopped in they would visit the blacksmiths first, Nikandros remembering that the man in the Exalted’s vision had been holding a smith’s hammer in his dominant hand. It must be a clue. Either the man was a smith, or someone quite close to one. A smith’s son perhaps.

Or, some small voice would say, wasn’t Egeria rumored to be of the gods? Late at night Nik would lie awake, surrounded by his sleeping countrymen and think on what he learned of the history of Akielos while he was serving at the kingsmeet. The line of Akielon kings and queens had always been rumored to be sired by the god Hephaestus. And it was actually Egeria who was directly of that line, her statue standing tall and proud in line with her ancestors. Theomedes-Exalted had married into the family. And it was common knowledge that the queen had never been able to give an heir, so Theomedes had taken a mistress and she had granted him one. Kastor. Who had no gods-blood in him and who was next in line for the throne.

So perhaps, somehow, Egeria had had a son. Or, the man in the vision was a cousin. But still of the line of Hephaestus. Which would explain the hammer, a symbol of the god of fire and forge.

But there was no real way to check out that avenue of thought. So they went with their first and only real option: checking every blacksmith from the south all the way up to the farthest reaches of the north.

They’d gotten lucky in the top corner of Mellos. There was a man, a smith unparalleled in his creation. Truly a man favored by Hephaestus himself who could create the most magical things from nearly nothing. A man who could create a sword that would never break, horseshoes that never wore down, the smallest pieces of jewelry that shone and shone and shone and never needed to be polished.

And this man was said to be in Delpha, Marlas to be specific.

Every smith they stopped in in Sicyon and even along the western coast of Delpha told them the same. Tales of this man who could work miracles of any piece of metal.

And then when they’d arrived in Marlas Nikandros had headed directly for the nearest smithy and he’d happened upon the right one entirely by chance. Or maybe he’d been led there by the gods. Who was to know?

The old man at the front had shown Nikandros some of the most beautiful swords he’d ever seen, leagues and leagues better than anything even the royal smiths could create, and he’d _known_. This. This man was who’d they’d been looking for. Whether he was a threat was still to be seen. But they’d found him. The man from the Exalted’s vision.

Except the old man in the front had refused to let Nik meet the smith who’d made the swords. He’d lied directly to Nikandros’ face and said the man wasn’t in. Nevermind the fact that two different himations had been hung at the front door. Two sets of sandals set along the wall. Nikandros hadn’t wanted to force an old man, especially one so clearly well versed in not only making weapons but using them as well, and so he’d given in and accepted the old man’s excuses. Marlas wasn’t a big town, surely one man can’t hide from all of Nik’s men that easily.

He’d posted Pallas outside the smith, across the street in plain clothes. And when the old man had left, Pallas reported a younger man leaving the smithy as well. Pallas had followed him on a winding path through the streets and alleys of Marlas before turning back around to report that the man had gone east on horse. He didn’t live in Marlas, but clearly he lived close enough to come in every morning for work.

And so he’d given his men the night off. It was the night before the summer solstice anyways, and likely they’d be able to blend into the crowds tomorrow and do some further scouting. Find out some more information about this mysterious smith.

He and Pallas had decided to go down the street from their inn to a local tavern for a proper hot meal after nights out under the open sky.

And they’d been lucky again.

The moment their eyes met across the tavern all of Nikandros had gone cold. Like he’d been doused in one of the few icy springs that comes down from the northern mountains. There, sitting at a table in the center of the tavern was a young man. A young man who looked like the spitting image of Queen Egeria’s statue in the kingsmeet. The strong nose and sharp jawline were easily recognizable. The curve of his high cheekbones just as regal and stately as the late queen’s. The eyes were new. But, Nikandros thought for a wild second, if the statue had come to life – full of color and movement. Something in him is sure that her eyes would have been the exact same shade of wise brown.

She’d had a son then. A direct son of her line. Someone with a proper and complete claim to the throne, if he even had any idea who he was.

Or perhaps they’d been unlucky.

As the man turned away from Nikandros to look at his two newly arrived companions Nikandros was jolted again. This time as if he’d been struck by Zeus’ lightning.

An older woman had sat down with the young man almost immediately, but the other companion who’d come to the table had not. He spoke for a brief moment to the both of them before walking calmly and easily over to the bar to order. But Nik was frozen. The sound of the tavern had faded away till all he could hear was the sound of his heart beating wildly in his chest.

Because it wasn’t just any old man who left the bar and joined the young man. Even after twenty six years, Nikandros would know that man anywhere. It was his father, Stavos. Alive and well and clearly friendly with a man who looked to be Egeria’s son.

Pallas nudged him and he was quick to school his features into a blank calm he didn’t feel. He led Pallas to a table as close to his father and the two people he was with as he could. Which turned out to be nearly right beside them. He’d shared a wordless look with Pallas who, after working under Nikandros for seven years knew an order when he saw one even when it was wordless, had gotten back up and gone to place their order while Nikandros struggled to get his heart back under control and stop his thoughts from sprinting about wildly with no purpose.

What was happening? How was his father alive? Who was the boy who so closely resembled Egeria?

What was he going to do now?

~

Kastor is sitting in his study, idly sharpening a small dagger on a whetstone with his feet propped up on his large oak desk when the doors burst open with no warning. He doesn’t flinch though, instead waiting to see who it is who’s decided to come into his personal rooms without knocking. He intends to inflict whatever punishment will cure him of this divisive boredom on the unlucky guard or servant. Perhaps lashes would do. He hasn’t given anyone lashes in absolute _ages_.

But it’s not a servant or guard or even a slave who’s come into his room unannounced. It’s his father.

He drops his feet from his desk, the bottoms of his leather sandals making a small slap sound as they hit the floor. He’s up and on his feet in less than two seconds, his little project forgotten on his desk. He bows his head as is customary, but when he looks back up it’s to see Theomedes isn’t even focused on him. Instead he’s pacing across the study floor, a determined look to his face and set in his shoulders.

“Father?” He asks, carefully sitting back down but with proper posture this time as he watches his father pace back and forth.

“Absolutely nothing.” He says from seemingly nowhere and Kastor blinks.

“Pardon?” He’s not expecting Theomedes to snarl and spin on his heel, stalking towards him and grabbing the dagger he’s been sharpening so he can gesture with it.

“There has been absolutely no word from Nikandros about the bloody search I’ve sent him on.”

Ah, Kastor thinks. This again.

He relaxed back into the chair, pulling his feet back up so they rest on the corner of his desk like they did before. “You didn’t exactly give the man much to go on, father. Your dreams haven’t---“

“They are not DREAMS.” Theomedes shouts and Kastor has to fight to hold back the flinch that wants to take over. Instead he slowly moves to prop his head up on one closed fist, watching his father twist the dagger with an easy hand. “They are visions. Ares has seen fit to answer my prayers and warn me of this threat. They aren’t dreams.” He says at a more tolerable volume and Kastor’s brows furrow.

“Alright fine. Visions. What’s one man going to be able to do though, father, against the might of the Akielon Army and all our guards. What danger could we possibly be in from one man.” Kastor asks, once again bored. He’s sick of being forced to take his father’s clear lunacy as fact and not fiction.

“One man could tear down the entirety of this kingdom in less than a day. Don’t you doubt that. You don’t know who he is.”

“And you do?” Kastor questions doubtfully. Theomedes turns sharp eyes his way.

“That bitch of a wife of mine, before I made your mother my consort. Egeria, she had a son.” He spits and it takes a second for the words to hit Kastor but when they do his eyes widen.

“But that would mean—“

“Exactly. The son of a bitch could ruin everything.” Theomedes casts a scowl at his feet and that’s all the warning he gets before his feet are being shoved off the desk. They hit the floor with a loud slap that makes his ankles ache. “I want him dead, just like his stupid mother, but he’s had help to keep him hidden.” Theomedes growls, stabbing the dagger into the map of Akielos that’s always spread out across Kastor’s desk underneath all his books and letters. Kastor spares a glance to see that the dagger has gone completely through the painted name ‘ _Marlas_ ’. When he looks back up his eyes meet his fathers.

“You. I want you to gather a troop of the best of your men. Thirty of them at least. Fifty if you can get them ready on such short notice. If Nikandros isn’t having any fucking luck perhaps you will.” Kastor’s eyes widen.

“You want me to go after this supposed son of Egeria?” He asks, incredulous, standing as Theomedes turns and begins walking for the door. “With _fifty_ men!?”

Theomedes tugs open one of the doors and passes through it, not answering. Kastor follows, ignoring the guards that trail behind them and watch them as he walks down the hallway matching Theomedes’ furious pace. It’s a sea of men and women ducking into startled bows but neither royal notice.

“Father! That seems like overkill. If I took ten of my best men we could be gone in less than an hour and we could meet up with the Captain’s contingent. There’s no way some idiot smith boy is going to be able to fight even five of our trained men, let alone the numbers you claim to—“

“I have seen it!” Theomedes shouts. Turning and shoving Kastor up against a nearby pillar in the corridor, a hand against his throat just tight enough to restrain him. “Sent upon a bloody sparrow every full moon for the past year! Either the gods are mocking me or Ares is answering my prayers with a warning. Not that it matters in the end. I _will_ have this man dead before he can do the same to us. Do you understand?”

He nods tightly against the wall and Theomedes abruptly released him, storming off in a cloud of billowing fabric down the hallway. Kastor takes a moment to pull in a surprised breath, dismissing the two guards who’d followed this far with an angry flick of his wrist. He turns away before he can see their bows. He’s filled with a white hot embarrassment at being seen in such a position in front of his men. Men who must only ever see him at his strongest.

He turns sharply on his heels, lashing out at one of the marble pillars nearby and blindly punching it with a closed fist. The sharp stab of pain does nothing to ease his anger but a flicker of movement beside him on the ledge of the balcony between the pillars distracts him. He watches curiously as a little sparrow hops around on the sculpted marble, flapping its wings once, twice, thrice, before it settles down and tilts its head to watch him curiously right back.

He scowls down at it, cradling his one bleeding hand to his chest and swatting out with the other one. The bird doesn’t move, keeping it’s beady little eyes focused directly on his.

“Go away. Get out of here.” He snarls. It finally flies away just as he reaches out to grab it with his good hand.

Without another word Kastor storms down the hallways, back the way he’d come, calling for a servant to fetch a physician on his way back to his rooms.

He doesn’t watch as the sparrow flies around the corner of the corridor, growing in size and changing in shape until in its place stands a tall and slender woman wrapped in the lightest of white silks. Her dark brown skin stands at a stark contrast to the fabric of her dress, her eyes shine a bright and haunting blue. Her hair curls artfully around her head, braided into intricate designs and weaved through with brilliant pearls. She watches quietly as the Prince storms down the corridors, watching as his figure disappears behind each marble pillar and reappears on the other side until he turns a corner and goes deeper into the palace and out of her sight.

Her lips turn up at the corners, twisting into a deep and cruel grin. She turns and walks away, deeper into the palace gardens until she finds the small abandoned altar in the very center. With a single touch of her hand it’s restored to its previous glory, dust and decayed plant matter blown away in the wind and a single white rose left in its place. She traces a finger delicately along the edges of the petals, her lips move but no sound comes out. But she has spoken a voice into the wind and it flies from the garden on a warm summer breeze.

_‘Damianos.’_


	3. so i’ll come around

_~_

_there will come a ruler_ _  
__whose brow is laid in thorn_ _  
__smeared with oil like david's boy, o lei o lai o lord_ _  
__o lei, o lai, oh lei, o lord_

 _smeared with oil like david's boy,_ _  
__o lei o lai o lord_

_~_

Damen wakes on the morning of the solstice to a soft sea breeze blowing one of his curls into his eyes. He brings a sleep slow hand up to brush the hair from his face while he sits up, looking curiously at the open window of his room. He’s certain he left it closed last night.

Then it all comes rushing back to him. Everything else from the night. He gets dressed for the solstice day in a daze.

After their rather tense dinner at the tavern they’d all walked the way home in silence. Damen hadn’t known how to break it and Stavos seemed to be too deep in thought to try.

Stavos and Helen had lit the few lanterns they kept inside the house, ushering him to sit at the small kitchen table while they sat across from him. They’d all sat in silence for a few more uncomfortable moments before Stavos leaned forward, his arms crossed as they rested on the tabletop, and began to speak.

His voice was steady and never wavered. Not as he talked about growing up alongside the late queen Egeria of Akielos. How close they were, how he thought of her as family and she the same. He tells of her coronation and all the rules that had to be met before she could be crowned. How she had to find a husband of high birth from one of the right Akielon lines, how Theomedes had seemed to be exactly what her father was looking for and how he urged the two of them together until they married.

Stavos told Damen of how Theomedes was quickly revealed to be nothing short of a monster, especially in regards to his treatment of Egeria. How insulting he was and degrading and how he took other women as lovers right before her eyes while she could do nothing. How he had a son with one of those women, all the while Egeria kept losing her own children before they could be born.

He told Damen of how Egeria became so desperate for a child of her own, a way out of the awful marriage she’d been tricked into, that she turned to the gods and begged and begged for any of them to help her.

Helen spoke up then, and told of how a sparrow had come to Egeria in a dream and told her to escape the palace and get to somewhere safe. So Egeria had left the palace at Ios and retreated to the Summer Palace for a week, both to get away from Theomedes and to listen to the goddess.

Aphrodite had visited her on the first night, disguised in the body of that of a man with olive skin the same color as Egeria’s and long black hair loose in waves, but with eyes as bright grey as stone dried on the beach. The goddess had approached the queen and taken her hands before kissing both her cheeks. They’d spoken for a few quiet moments that Helen had seen before Aphrodite had leaned forward to kiss the queen and Helen had ducked away to give them privacy.

The next morning the queen had quietly told her that it had worked and she now carried a child. For the next five days two of Aphrodite’s attendants would arrive at the summer palace and bless both Egeria and the child. And on their last day at the summer palace a small quail had swooped down from one of the olive trees beside the entrance and settled on Egeria’s shoulder. It had sat there for the entire horse ride back to the palace in Ios before flying off just inside the palace gates.

Egeria had taken it as a symbol of Hephaestus’ support, as he was the father of the entire line of Akielon Kings and Queens since the birth of Akielos. And Egeria was directly from his line.

She’d managed to hide the pregnancy from Theomedes, especially as he was more preoccupied with his main mistress and the son she had borne him, who was now old enough to need tutors in most subjects and a lot of attention to keep him in his classes.

But she couldn’t hide it forever, and when Theomedes had found out he’d exploded and in a fit of anger he’d tried to hurt Egeria, only to be stopped by Stavos stepping in and blocking his path every time he tried to reach her. Even when Theomedes had pulled out his sword, Stavos stayed in the way until Egeria had ordered all the other guards to remove Theomedes and take him back to his rooms. They followed the order reluctantly and Egeria had known from that moment on she was in great danger.

She’d been walking on eggshells, constantly looking over her shoulder for the last months of her pregnancy. Everywhere she turned there were people whispering and watching her disdainfully. Guards would only follow her orders after she gave them five or more times, and even then it was with extreme reluctance. Even those men of her own closest guard began to change around her, all except Stavos.

The night she fell into labour was a terrible one, a large storm had swirled in and the screams of Egeria in pain were interrupted constantly by lightning and thunder as it rolled across the sky. Helen had been at her side the whole time, and she was there when the few truly loyal physicians had quietly informed the queen that she wouldn’t be making it for much longer than perhaps the night.

They’d retreated and left the queen and her new child in her room for a moment. But a moment was all that was needed. Helen had left to grab some fresh water, and on her way back she heard some of the guards speaking of impossible things. She was just around the corner as the head of the Kings Guard approached and informed the men that they were to capture the queen tonight. The King was charging her with treason. And if she fought at all she was to be killed.

Helen had raced back to the Queen’s rooms and they’d escaped out one of the secret servants doors into the dead of the night.

All sounds of thunder and flashes of lighting had stopped. The night was silent, and between one passing group of marching guards and the next Helen and Egeria had managed to get to the outermost corridor of the palace only to see everything bathed red.

The sky was no longer full of clouds, it was as if the gods themselves had blown them all away. All the stars shone brightly in the sky but were eclipsed by the terrifying sight of the moon, low and large in the sky, glowing a bright and haunting red.

It was at that point that Damen had gasped, jolted into a sense of déjà vu. He suddenly remembered a dream he’d had the night before. A dream he’d been having since he was a child but would always forget about upon waking.

“It’s—I saw you. I saw all of you.” He whispered, his heart racing in his chest. He’d looked up at Stavos and Helen with wide eyes. “I saw as you helped them escape the castle and all three of you had ridden up here. I… I saw her die. My—My mother. In a dream.”

Stavos’s face was aged with sadness as his eyes met Damen’s across the table.

“She wanted to reach Vere. She knew Hennike, the Queen of Vere, from when they were girls. She knew Hennike would take you in and help protect you. That you’d both be safe there and you’d be able to grow. When we’d passed into Delfeur we thought we’d made it. Impossibly we’d made the entire journey in just a night. But as we rode further to enter Arran we found out something even more impossible had happened. Vere was gone.”

“We found out later that it had sunken down into the water with no warning. That very same night, around the same time the order to capture you and your mother had been given. Something had angered the gods.” Helen had chimed in quietly, clasping and unclasping her hands. “The few Veretians who’d managed to escape to Delfeur would talk for nights and nights afterwards about possibilities. Many of them believed that it was Poseidon who had been angered. Just as Hephaestus was the father of Akielos, Poseidon was the father of Vere and apparently many were ceasing in their worship of him, instead switching to worship Ares instead as Vere began to grow in animosity to Vask.”

“Theomedes worshiped Ares.” Stavos had nearly growled, his face twisted into a dark look that Damen had never before seen on the usually stoic and calm man. “He refused to worship anyone else, insisting that Ares was the only god worth his time.” Stavos’ eyes lifted to meet Damen’s, and Damen found the pale grey to be clouded over in anger. “He despised everything about your mother he could find, and her gods were just one of the many.”

Helen had reached over then, putting one of her hands on Stavos’ clenched ones and Damen had sat silently for a moment, reeling at all the information.

He’s brought out of his thoughts by the sounds of movement beyond his bedroom door. He stands from where he’d been sitting, a crisp white chiton wrapped around his body and some new and untarnished sandals strapped securely up his calves. When he opens the door it’s to see Helen quietly setting out some bread and wine on the table. She looks up at the movement of him stepping into the room and smiles tightly at him.

‘ _Theítsa’_ is all he has to say, barely more than a whisper in the small room, before she’s coming round the table to sweep him into a tight hug.

“I’m so sorry we had to hide all of this from you, love.” She whispers into his chest, as high as she can reach now with him being full grown and at least two heads taller than she is.

He shakes his head, knowing she can feel the movement even if she can’t see the action. His hands are clenched in the back of her chiton, a fresh and light blue color but still smelling distinctly of the soap Helen has used his entire life. It’s a comforting smell, and he sinks into it a little deeper. Maybe, for just a second, he can forget the implications of his mother being Queen Egeria. Maybe he can forget that he’s Damianos and instead be Damen, for just a moment more.

~

Even as far from the festivities as he is, Damen can still hear them going in full swing. Music and laughing and the sounds of sandaled feet stomping in dirt are faint but they still reach him. He’d escaped the mess as soon as he was able, his long years of sneaking around making it remarkably easy to sneak away from even Stavos and Helen.

Now he finds himself down on the beach. One of the northern ones. Everyone who would be on the beach on a sunny day like today are likely to be on the beaches to the west, where it’s just a gradual decline of land into the sand. But in the north, along the old border, the land falls away in steep cliffs to reach the pale sand along the shoreline.

Damen used to climb down these cliffs nearly every other day as a kid, escaping from the teasing and taunting of his classmates for the fact that he was different from them. Darker skinned than them, and without parents, living on the far edges of town on a tiny dilapidated farm while the rest lived in Marlas and were constantly traipsing about in new clothes with new toys.

Only. Now he knows that he did in fact have a mother. And he even knows her name.

Egeria.

He sinks to his knees under the exhausting weight of pretending to be okay. Pretending to be the same Damianos he was yesterday. Part of him feels like crying. Weeping and mourning for the mother he never got to know who was clearly quite close to the two people who’ve raised him.

Another part is angry. Impossibly angry in a way he’s never felt before. The anger is directed to the King. The false pretender on the throne who stole everything from his mother. The man who has been sending troops of men all across Akielos in blatant search of Damen. The man who’s made his life nothing but hiding in a smithery and taking back alley streets while he parades around a palace as if he hasn’t killed the true queen of Akielos.

He’s so lost in thought and in trying to sort out his feelings that he almost doesn’t hear the peculiar splash of water to his right.

But he’s always been more observant than most.

He chances a glance over and sees nothing, just the calm waves of the sea as they shine in the morning sun. His brow furrows for a moment as his eyes travel along the waves, searching for possible causes of the noise. When he looks in front and behind him along the shoreline he doesn’t see a single soul. Nor is anyone climbing down the cliffs after him.

Another splash, but this time he’s ready for it. He sees a flash of blue scales and relaxes.

A fish then. One quite close to the surface, but there are always those more daring than others.

Damen wearily stands back up on his feet, running a hand through his hair. He takes one last look up towards the cliffs in the direction of Marlas before turning and heading off east, further away from the revelry.

He wanders aimlessly down the beach, plucking up stones and empty shells to examine before leisurely tossing them into the ocean. Sometimes, if a rock is shaped right he’ll try and whip it out into the sea to see if it’ll skip but they never do. As he walks he barely takes notice of the beach and cliffs changing around him, but change they do.

The top of the cliffs begins to grow higher and higher up into the sky, an impossibly height for even Damen to climb with any ease. The sand begins to disappear, large, cool grey boulders taking their place and sprouting up like particularly stubborn weeds. Soon enough he’s jumping from rock to rock with bounding steps instead of trudging along and getting sand in his sandals.

He stops when abruptly there’s nowhere further for him to walk.

The cliff looks like it’s pushed its way out and forged ahead of its surroundings to dive into the water as far as it can. It’s a few meters past the shoreline at least, and Damen sighs. He decides here’s as good a place as any to stop so he hops out to the furthest stone and sits down, one leg dangling down into the water and the other folded up for his elbow to rest on.

He reclines back just far enough to look up and watch as the clouds above lazily drift by in the morning sunlight, his one submerged foot offers a refreshing coolness to the heat of the sun he can feel on his skin. It takes him a moment to realize he can no longer hear the solstice festivities. He lets his eyes drift closed, keeping his face upturned to the sun like a flower in the springtime – happy for the heat after the cold stillness of winter. He tries to let his mind go blank, blank of absolutely everything, and it works for a time.

Long enough to hear singing start up from incredibly close by.

His eyes flutter open, his brows furrowed as he looks around the source of the sound but there’s still no one to be found. The song is a sad one, soft and sorrowful and something about it tugs at Damen’s heartstrings. Plucking at familiar hurts and aches that he’s tried to push away through the years that have all come rushing back at the new information of who he actually is. What happened to his mother.

He listens as the song continues, developing into highs and lows and bringing tears to his eyes that he’s helpless to stop. Impossibly, the song seems to be coming from around the corner of the cliff he’s been stopped by – the one that juts out from the rest of the cliff side and deep into the ocean. Far enough that he’s not certain anyone should try and swim around it lest they be caught in a current and pulled out to the seas.

“Hello?” he calls and the singing abruptly stops, the last cut-off note echoing off the rocks around him before they too fade into nothing. “Are you alright?” he tentatively calls, his voice thick, and receives nothing in answer but the sorrowful tune still rings in his ears. He sighs, looking away from the cliff side and down at his one submerged foot. He swings it from side to side in small figure eight motions, watching as the waves distort the shape of his foot and the fit of his sandal.

“I know how you feel.” He says quietly to the sea air, wiping his tears away with the heel of his palm.

“Do you?” A voice asks back and he startles so badly he loses his balance and falls off the boulder he’s been sitting on and into the ocean. When his head breeches the water it’s to the sound of laughter echoing off the cliffs around them – and to the sight of glittering blue eyes. “I apologize for startling you.”

It’s a man. And an impossibly beautiful one at that.

He’s got long blonde hair that disappears past his shoulders and keeps going further into the water below. His eyes shine a dazzling, and amused, blue as light as the sky on a cloudless summer day, and his lips are twisted into a teasing smirk. Perched upon his brow is a peculiar crown made up of shells and pieces of coral, gemstones winking from where they’re visible in between the strands of loose golden hair.

He tilts his head to one side and Damen’s eyes are inevitably drawn to the long line of his neck where a set of gills sits closed and--- Wait. A set of gills? Damen’s mouth opens and closes as his eyes flick back up to the man’s face. Sticking out of his hair are sharp points of pale skin that Damen had originally thought part of the crown, but with a slight adjustment of the man’s head it becomes completely clear it’s not part of the crown at all. It’s part of his ear. Or actually, it is his ear. Flicking up into impossible points and webbed with thin, nearly see-through membrane to link all the pieces.

Gills, webbed and pointed ears. The haunting singing from before. A tail that’s flicking about under the water but is too big to be mistaken for anything else.

“You… You’re--” He can’t make himself say it. It’s impossible. Isn’t it? 

“A Veretian?” The man says, his speaking voice just as melodic as his singing voice. His Veretian is smooth, and a completely different accent to the kind of Veretian that the locals rarely use now. But Damen can understand him all the same. Everyone in Delpha knew how to speak Veretian and Akielon, to account for the few Veretians who were left after the sinking of Vere. But that isn’t what Damen thought he was going to say. 

He’s bobbing up and down in time with the small waves and he’s got two large shoulder pauldrons made of shells and sea glass and other various ocean bits - just like his crown. A few delicate golden chains link the two shoulder pieces and rest across the man’s chest, shining in the sunlight. 

This is a very weird dream. 

“Well I would think so, considering I rather remember getting up this morning.” The man— fish? Fishman? Oh gods. Damen’s an idiot. And he’s clearly spoken aloud. 

He’s talking to a bloody merman. 

Of all the impossible myths that could turn out to be true—

“Have you gone mute?” The merman asks in his crisp accent, sounding very much like the few higher born Akielon lords speak when Damen can hear them through the walls of the smith. Aristocratic. 

Not only is Damen speaking to a merman. He’s speaking to a patrician Veretian merman. He can feel the beginnings of a confused headache forming behind his eyes. Or maybe it’s the brightness of all the jewels and pearls shining in his eyes that’s causing the pain. 

“I—no.” Damen says slowly, bringing a hand up to partially cover his eyes and guard them while he tries to get a better look at the man in front of him. The man with an ice blue tail making small waves around them. A sudden thought occurs to him, one that he thankfully doesn’t say aloud. Instead he asks a question of his own. “Was it you? Singing just earlier?” It’s likely a stupid thing to ask, especially considering they’re the only two people (can he call a merman a person? Or is he more a creature…) this far east on the beach. 

And the only way to get around the large, submerged cliff side would be by boat… Or to swim with a rather large fish tail. If you had one, that is. 

Is it mermaids (and men) that you’re not supposed to listen to sing or you’ll be taken and drowned alive? Or was that sirens? He swims slowly backwards until his back hits the boulder he’d been sitting on either way. 

His question has made the Veretian pause. Which. A Veretian. No, Damen’s pretty sure the headache forming is not from shiny baubles but from confusion and a sudden influx of crazy information. 

First he’s told he’s a Prince. Not only that but he’s part god, half from Aphrodite herself and then however small a percentage from Hephaestus - the actual father of Akielos. Then, when he comes down to the beach to get away from his thoughts he’s managed to stumble upon a merman who speaks perfect, if a bit old, Veretian. As in the country that was sunk deep beneath the sea on the day of Damen’s birth. 

The Veretian watches him for a moment, face carefully blank before his bright blue eyes dart away from Damen’s and look shyly down into the water. His shoulders curl in on themselves, the shells and other decorations on his pauldrons shifting like a chime as he moves. It’s the most timid Damen’s seen him in the few short minutes since he’s fallen into the ocean. It makes something in Damen lower his hand and pause, curious despite the potential dangers of the situation - as insane as it seems. 

“Yes that—that was me singing.” He sighs, his brows scrunching in on themselves and one of his hands coming up to brush webbed fingers through golden hair. “I’m surprised you heard it. No one usually ventures this far down the beaches. I figured I’d be alone.” He looks sad now, and Damen feels his mouth curling down in a guilty frown. 

“To be honest I’m not usually this far east either. Not as close to Marlas as we are. But I needed to get away from the festivities and just… have a moment to myself.” He offers. “I’m sorry for intruding. It seems as though you come here often to get away from… Whatever it is you needed to escape. I didn’t mean to interrupt you just—you seemed quite sad is all.” He says haltingly. 

The Veretian sinks lower into the water until his nose is just barely brushing the tops of the small waves. He pushes his mouth above the water just enough to speak. 

“My—” He sighs again. “It’s nothing.” He seems to shake himself off, as if banishing whatever thought from his head. But the movement brings a sudden clarity to Damen and he can feel himself actually shivering. Even as close to the summer as it is, the ocean this far north never gets warm enough for an actual proper swim. Not like the oceans down near Ios, he’s heard, where you can spend the whole day in the water and not freeze even the slightest bit. 

He brings his hands in, folding his arms so he can rub his hands against his biceps to try and bring some warmth to them. 

“I—sorry. I’m just gonna get back up on the rock. The water’s a bit too cold for any lengthy swim and I wasn’t prepared for one anyways.” He awkwardly motions behind him and the Veretian cocks his head to the side, curious once more as he twists and pulls himself back up onto the sun-warm rock. He tries to wring his chiton out as much as he’s able, laying it out on the rock around him and tucking his legs into a crossed formation to keep them close and out of the water. 

“You find the water cold?” The merman asks and Damen blinks, looking up from where he’d been retying the loosened knot of the belt across the middle of his chiton. 

“This far north? Yes. We’re only just getting out of spring, we’re the only province to get snow in the winter, so we’ve got to wait for that to all melt and go away but our springs are generally quite cold and windy if they’re not cold and rainy. Though even trying to swim in the middle of summer is an exercise in how long you could possibly last. Why? Doesn’t it bother you how cold it is? All you’re wearing are shells and pearls.” He points out and watches as the Veretians lips twitch up in the corners in a quick movement. 

“No. I’m not cold at all. It’s actually quite nice, today.” He counters and Damen tries not to think about how that could be, for fear of making his headache worse. “I’m sorry for startling you into falling.” The Veretian apologizes, voice soft and Damen shrugs, laughing to himself a little as he leans his elbows on his knees and twists his hands together. 

“I’ve hopped into the ocean on colder days. Besides, it’s rather sunny. I’ll dry out and warm up soon enough.” 

They sit in silence after that, and Damen can’t tell if it’s awkward or not. But just as he opens his mouth to say something, anything, he’s not really sure what, the Veretian’s head snaps up and his eyes go wide. 

“I have to go.” He says and Damen blinks. 

“What? How do you know?” 

The Veretian gives him a curious look. “I can hear one of my gu—one of my friends calling for me. My mother or brother is probably looking for me. They hate it when I leave without telling anyone.” He slowly begins to back away from Damen, back into deeper waters but keeping eye contact. As if he thinks Damen’s going to disappear if he looks away, which, Damen can relate. 

“Wait!” Damen calls, suddenly struck. “I never learned your name!” The merman stops backing away and tilts his head to one side, his hair falling out from where it’d been pushed behind one webbed ear and framing his face. 

“I don’t know yours either.” He points out and Damen can’t help the amusing grin from spreading across his face. 

“Damen. My family calls me Damen.” 

“Damen…” He looks down into the ocean as he says it, soft as a whisper on the sea breeze. He looks back up, his eyes glinting like the pearls hanging by his temples. “My name is Laurent.” He says just as softly and Damen nods. 

“Laurent.” He holds out his left hand and Laurent looks at it with furrowed brows. His lips twitch but he stops himself from laughing. “You hold out your hand as well. It’s a greeting.” Laurent gives him a look that says ‘I don’t know if I believe you’ which makes Damen actually laugh out loud. But he holds out his left hand all the same, swimming in close and letting Damen put their hands palm to palm. He slowly folds their hands together, shaking them up and down once, twice, thrice, before opening his hand so Laurent can pull away. But he doesn’t. 

He’s frowning consideringly at where he’s still holding Damen’s hand. 

“That’s how Akielon’s greet each other?” He asks and Damen shrugs, trying to ignore how warm Laurent’s hand is in his and how, this close, Laurent smells impossibly like the soft scent of roses as they first bloom. 

“You don’t greet each other like this where you’re from?” He inquires, unable to look away from Laurent’s face. A mischievous grin slowly spreads across Laurent’s thin, but surprisingly pink lips and Damen tries to ignore how the sight makes his heart stutter. 

Laurent pulls himself in as close as he can, using Damen’s hand as an anchoring point before letting go to place both hands on the rock in front of Damen’s folded legs. He waits for a few seconds, clearly psyching himself up before pushing up out of the water and leaning in. 

Damen sucks in a breath just as Laurent’s lips brush feather-soft against one cheek and then the other, the faint sounds of his lips parting like a soft music in Damen’s ear. And then in the next moment he’s gone, back in the water and a few meters away. 

Damen has to work for a moment to actually get himself to swallow, and to close his mouth. Laurent’s laughter sounds like the chimes the wise-women Helen works with on the western edge of Marlas have hanging in front of their homes and places of work to ward off dark spirits. 

“That’s how we greet each other in Vere.” He calls, laughter still thick in his voice and in the twist of his smile. And then, with a graceful twist of his body he turns and dives into the dark water, his ice blue tail flicking bits of water into the air before it disappears smoothly and quietly into nothingness. 

Then his words hit Damen. 

In Vere. 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> art by the lovely @diamythal on tumblr, please go check her out y'all she's an absolute bean


	4. someday

_~_

_o lei, o lai, o lei, o lord_ _  
__he will tear your city down, o lei o lai_

_o_

_~_

Day in and day out Damen’s life doesn’t change all that much from what it was before he found out the truth about who he really was. Not his working life anyways.

He still goes to work, sneaking out of the cottage in the early morning so as not to wake Stavos or Helen and to give himself enough time to watch the sunrise over the distant mountains of Vask and Patras. He still spends most of his time hidden away in the deepest parts of the smithy, listening in as Aegeus sells his work. He still helps out around Marlas in his spare time, helping till ground for crops or deadhead old growth to help promote new. He puts his careful hands to use helping fishermen weave and tie and knot their new and old broken nets. He helps one of Aegeus’ friends build a boat, as the old man doesn’t have any children to help him with it.

It’s all the same as he’d usually do.

What’s not the same are his near constant forays down the rocky cliffs to the northern beaches of Marlas. He makes his way out to the spot where he’d first met Laurent almost every other day when he’s not busy with anything else.

And he’s even been taking forays to the beach near his house in the mornings. Every morning.

After sneaking out he climbs nimbly down the narrow paths till his sandals sink into cold sand not yet kissed by the day’s sun. Then he usually walks the entire way to Marlas in a slow, meandering pattern, while watching the sunrise as it reflects off the ocean.

Even on the days Laurent can’t stop to talk, he always finds a way to leave a message for Damen.

In the past week, it seems he’s managed to recruit some help, as evident by this morning where Damen watched a particularly mischievous dolphin splash about before it nosed a little bottle across the waves and as close to shore as it could get.

The bottom edge of his chiton had still been wet from wading in to fetch it when he’d reached the smithy. Aegeus had given him a curious look but hadn’t tried to ask him any questions, which was just as well because Damen was rather certain he was about to burst with giddy excitement.

Inside the bottle had been a handwritten missive in neat, curly Veretian.

_‘Talk to you tonight? - L’_

~

Damen hasn’t been sitting out on what he’s started calling His Boulder for long when he hears the telltale splash of Laurent arriving. He’d managed to finish his commissions early today, just so he’d had enough time before the sun set to come down and meet Laurent before he had to head home for the night. He’d also completely taken advantage of his extensive knowledge of all the backstreets in Marlas to make a quick escape before anyone could ask him for help with any favors or tasks. (Which he feels mildly guilty over, but the excitement of getting to talk to Laurent outweighs that guilt at the moment.)

The moment he sees Laurent’s head emerge from the water, though, his smile fades. Something’s wrong.

“Laurent?” He watches Laurent slowly swim closer. He’s a complete wreck, something Damen’s never seen. Even without the crown and the pauldrons – as Laurent had admitted a few days after their first meeting, had been purely ceremonial wear for their own solstice festival – Laurent has always been somehow perfectly put together.

But today. Today his hair is a tangled mess around his head, the tips of his webbed ears just peeking through in a few hectic spots and then the rest hidden beneath knots. His eyes are red and swollen as if he’s been crying and his lips look to be chewed raw. He’s not wearing any jewelry, and usually he’s always wearing some small thing – like a ring or a necklace. But today he’s completely bare. And his tail, from what Damen can see, is not its usual ice blue but is instead a murky grey.

Laurent takes a shaky breath before his face completely crumples and Damen reaches out but Laurent is still too far away in the water.

“Laurent what’s wrong?” Laurent shakes his head, fresh tears falling down his face and pooling beneath his chin before dripping into the sea.

“It’s. I can’t—” He stutters, bringing his hands up to make frustrated claws as if he can grab whatever’s bothering him and tear it up.

Damen takes the chance and slips off his boulder and into the water. It’s not nearly as cold as it was the day that he first met Laurent all those weeks ago, but it’s still not warm either. It doesn’t matter though, as Damen ignores the temperature as best as he’s able and swims out the small way to meet Laurent. He cautiously reaches out and wraps his hands around Laurent’s wrists. Up this close Damen can see that his fingers have actually changed, they’ve elongated and his nails have sharpened into points.

Damen stands there, his feet deep in the cold sand and the sea halfway up his chest, holding Laurent’s wrists until Laurent finally looks up at him and starts talking.

“Since I was little, it was always known that I would have to marry for duty. I was never interested. Marriage sounded dull, having to link yourself to someone and constantly be around them and please them. I told my brother that _he_ could get married for Vere, and I’d live in the library by myself. He laughed when I was younger but as I’ve been getting older he and my mother have been constantly pushing me to meet other nobles my age and eventually to try and court some of them.” He begins haltingly, letting Damen lead him closer and closer to the shore and the boulders they usually hang around.

Damen says nothing, just giving Laurent as encouraging a look as he can and waiting it out as Laurent gets everything off his chest. He doesn’t want to risk interrupting him and having Laurent stop talking.

“That first day. The day we met, that’s… That’s why I was up here singing. I just… I’d just spent a month helping to host most of the nobles and courtiers and it was exhausting and overwhelming. Usually, people used to ignore me. Or they’d despair of me and call me cold and rude. But suddenly now, with the potential for any of them to marry a Prince they’re acting like they’re my closest friends. They pretend to try and court me but take no time to consider what I like – or how I’d even like to be courted. Not a single one of them knows any of my interests and yet they stand beside me and talk to me as if it’s undoubted that they’re going to become consort to a prince. Men, women, anyone and everyone all suddenly vying for my attention to further their own agenda.” Laurent makes a frustrated noise in the back of his throat, flexing his clawed hands but not struggling out of Damen’s light hold.

“And now my mother has set a deadline. And if I don’t choose someone within the week she’s going to choose someone. And I know exactly who she’ll pick.”

He swallows, his voice growing thick, and when he looks up from his clenched hands and into Damen’s eyes it’s like all the fight and tension leaves him. He slumps forward, his forehead hitting Damen square in the chest with a thump.

“I—I’m sorry. I don’t have the best advice to give, considering I’ve never been in this position. But you deserve better than fake people trying to get close to you like that.” Damen murmurs, hesitantly bringing a hand up to run it through Laurent’s hair. Laurent makes a noise close to a purr and Damen takes that as a positive reaction. He continues to brush Laurent’s hair with his fingers, picking out all the knots and twirls and mess until it’s back to its usual glory. Even as wet as it is, his hair is incredibly soft and Damen idly wonders what it’d be like to do this when Laurent has dry hair.

Damen is trying to repress the shivers that want to rake through his body from the temperature of the water around them. If he was moving and swimming he might be warmer, but as it is the sun is setting and they’re just staying in one spot. He continues to brush his hand through Laurent’s hair, even when he’s completed his self-imposed task. It’s only when he feels the brush of fingers on his hips under the water that he stops moving his hand.

Immediately the hands retreat and Laurent tries to pull away but Damen pulls him in closer. “It’s alright. You just startled me is all.” Laurent’s hands tentatively touch his hips again before they slip around his back and clasp each other. The movement pulls Laurent right into Damen’s space, their chests touching. If he focuses hard enough he can feel Laurent’s tail pushing small currents of water around beneath the surface.

“I—I haven’t been held by anyone like this in years.” Laurent quietly mumbles into the wet chiton across his chest and Damen hums.

“I used to demand hugs and cuddles from my auntie all the time. It was only as I got bigger and bigger that they started to become less and less. I think everyone could always use a good hug.”

Laurent laughs wetly, turning his head to the side and resting one webbed ear to Damen’s chest.

“You’re rather warm.”

“I’d say you’re rather cold but I can’t feel much of anything in this water. I think my skin is going numb.”

~

This Lamen is a hard man to keep track of. Or, as Nikandros found out, this Damen is a hard man to keep track of. Just recently Nik had sent Pallas to follow the man once more, to wait outside the smithy as he worked and then to follow him around Marlas for as long as he was in for.

Someone from the tavern had called out to him in passing, they’d called him Damen. When Pallas had nonchalantly asked the girl who Damen was she had explained that he was originally the Blacksmith’s apprentice, but that he’d quickly outgrown the role. The Blacksmith had called him Lamen when Nikandros had first asked about him.

And now, since their arrival three weeks ago, Nikandros has noticed that this Damen seems to be going out of his way to be both incredibly evasive and not nearly as evasive as a man of his position should be. Some days it’s nearly impossible to find him and to follow him, meaning he must have at least some inkling as to the fact that he’s a Prince and he’s in danger. And then others he’s seen all over town, out in the open with no disguise and nothing to hide. Some people call him Lamen, many more call him Damen. So clearly, if it’s supposed to be a secret it’s not a well-kept one. Or perhaps he doesn’t care. Perhaps he thinks he’s in no danger – which is where he’s wrong, Nikandros thinks.

Nearly every night he disappears, and no matter who he sets to camp out and watch the road or even the small cottage where the man lives, no one sees him arrive home. And no one sees him leave in the mornings either, and yet he leaves the smith at noon every day to go and visit with the older woman Nikandros had seen him with that first night. Or, he has lunch with the older woman and Nikandros’ father.

Nikandros’ father who seems to be quite fond of the boy, protective even.

Something awful twists in Nik’s gut whenever he sees them together. When he sees Stavos put his hand on Damen’s shoulder and give him an amused grin. He can barely remember the last time his father smiled at him like that and yet here he is. With the child of the woman who he betrayed Nikandros’ family for. Who he abandoned Nikandros for.

Despite having been here for weeks now, Nikandros has sent nothing back to the palace in Ios. No confirmation, or even suspicion that he’s found who Theomedes-Exalted is looking for. Until he gets more information, he doesn’t want to jump to any conclusions. Which might be quite unloyal for a member of the Royal Guard, but something about the entire situation doesn’t seem right. This far North without even a Kyros to report to, Nikandros feels as though he’s got enough time to figure out if this man, Lamen – Damen – whoever he is, really is a danger to Akielos or if the King isn’t telling all of the truth.

Nikandros stands in the meager training ring Marlas has, practicing with Lydos while he waits for Aktis and Elon to come back from their scouting mission for the day. The second week they’d been here he’d caved and bought one of Damen’s swords, arguing with the Blacksmith for nearly an hour before he’d given up on prompting the man to have them meet face to face. It was perfectly balanced and fit into Nikandros’ hand like it’d been made for him. He was a rather adept sword-fighter, but this sword somehow made him faster, made his swings more dangerous and more nimble. He’d knocked Lydos’ sword from his hand three times in ten minutes.

Just as Lydos picked his sword back up, determination steeling his face, Pallas came running into the ring.

“Captain! Captain!” His voice was high with urgency, in his hands was a scroll of paper. He wordlessly handed it to Nikandros after he slid to a stop in the sand beside him. Lydos put his sword back in its scabbard and sauntered over, rubbing at his right wrist.

“What is it, Captain?” He asks as Nikandros takes the scroll and turns it around. It’s sealed with dark red wax and the seal of Prince Kastor. Nikandros shares a look with Lydos and Pallas before cracking it open and reading. He can feel himself straightening out of surprise, his face twisting in surprise.

“The Prince is coming to Marlas. He’s bringing fifty men.” He says slowly, he looks up from the note to Pallas. “He knows we found him.”

~

“Is there anything you can do?” Damen asks, after Laurent has calmed down enough to swim closer to the boulders and be pulled to sit up on one beside Damen. Laurent shakes his head, his hair rubbing against Damen’s skin where he’s leaning his head on Damen’s shoulder. Damen can’t see his face, but he can tell Laurent’s still upset by how he keeps twisting his webbed fingers in the hem of Damen’s chiton.

“No. I haven’t got a choice. They want me to marry him in a week. They’ve been putting more security and guards in place to try and stop be from sneaking out so much but there are so many hidden places in that palace that they don’t know about that it’s nearly child’s play to get away anyways. I thought… I thought I’d have more time. That I could come up with a proper reason they’d listen to on why I want to choose who I get married to but it’s just another loose end they want to tie and I’m the string.” He mutters as he turns more fully into Damen’s chest and Damen takes the hint, pulling him into another hug. Laurent sinks into it, one of his hands coming up to wrap around Damen’s neck and hold him in return.

He rubs a hand down Laurent’s back, lightly trailing his fingers up and down and around in mindless swirls and loops. They’re slowly drying out up on the boulder, or well Damen is slowly drying out. Most of Laurent’s tail is still down in the water, but Damen hasn’t actually seen all that much of his tail from this close before.

Without thinking about it he reaches out to touch a fingertip along some of the scales near Laurent’s hip and Laurent jolts in his arms. He pulls back at the same time that Laurent leans away and sees Damen’s outstretched hand.

“Oh. You startled me.” He says, reaching out and pulling Damen’s hand into his own. The claws are long gone, his fingers back to their normal, just-webbed-not-pointy glory. His hands are unbelievably soft as they flip Damen’s hand around between them.

“Sorry.” Damen mumbles but Laurent just shakes his head and laughs. He runs a trailing index finger along the calluses at the top of Damen’s palm.

“If I had lived my whole life without seeing someone with a tail I think I’d be curious about it too. Your hands are so… Rough.” He wonders, his lips turning down at the corners and now it’s Damen who laughs.

“They’re like that because I use them a lot.” He teases and Laurent rolls his head along with his eyes to give Damen a bland look. Damen’s lips twitch up into an easy smile. “I work with metal all day, these came from blisters. It’s like protection on the parts of my hand that get used the most. Nearly everyone has them.”

Laurent keeps tracing around his callouses, twisting his hand this way and that before turning one of his own hands over and laying it in Damen’s so that they’re both palm up. “No one in Vere has these. I think the sea water and the sand wears them away.”

“Or.” Damen says, pulling his hand out from under Laurent’s so he can instead turn it so that they’re pressed together palm to palm. “Maybe, your skin is just different. Like how you don’t feel the cold of the water like I do. Maybe your skin is made of tougher stuff.”

Damen looks down at their hands as he speaks. Laurent’s hand is smaller than his, he could probably curl his fingers at the tips right overtop of Laurent’s. And his skin is so much darker than Laurent’s, warmed by countless summer days and bold like burnished brass to Laurent’s moonlight color. Damen doesn’t think he’s seen anyone so pale. Even among the Veretians who’d managed to get to Delpha before the sinking.

When he chances a look up at Laurent’s face it’s to see Laurent looking steadily back at him. The red around his eyes has faded some, and his hair looks better for Damen’s work. His cheeks and neck are blossoming a faint red though, and Damen frowns.

“Are you feeling better?” He tries to ask, only he gets about halfway through the sentence before Laurent leans in until they’re nearly nose to nose.

“Kiss me.”

“Wha—“

“Show me what it could be like, with someone who cares about me.” He continues in a rush, his words nearly blending together.

“Laurent I don’t think—“

“Please. Just—Just one kiss. I’ve never.” He trails off, curling in on himself and Damen twines their fingers together.

“Neither have I. You know.” He says just as quietly and Laurent looks up at him, faintly incredulous.

“But you—You’re so—You look—“ He keeps cutting himself off and Damen can’t help the small smile that spreads across his lips.

“No one here has ever liked me enough for these sorts of things. They’ve always seen me as an outsider, and around the time everyone was mostly concerned with well, experimenting, I was already working in the smithy and wasn’t really allowed to be around in town on my own.”

Laurent looks up at him consideringly.

“Did you want to?”

“Did I want to?”

“To kiss people. To, experiment as you said.” It’s asked quietly and Damen shrugs.

“I wondered, sometimes. What it would be like to hold someone’s hand just to be able to hold it. Or to kiss someone and be kissed in return. I think everyone kind of wants someone to care about them and be there for them.” He admits and Laurent reaches up with one finger to poke his cheek, it takes him a second to realize he’s poking where one of his dimples usually shows up and he can’t hold back the smile that forms said dimple beneath Laurent’s finger from sprouting.

He uses the hand not currently entwined with Laurent’s to reach up and cover Laurent’s hand so he’s holding his jaw. Laurent looks at his hand being held by Damen’s before looking back up into Damen’s eyes.

“You’re probably the kindest person I’ve ever met. The dumbest one as well, because I don’t know anyone else who would just blindingly trust someone they never met who was a kind of creature they’d never seen before. But you’re kind, and you listen, and I know you don’t have any ulterior motives in coming to talk to me and see me.”

“Well. I have one or two.” Damen admits and Laurent raises an eyebrow, but he seems more amused than weary.

“Oh?”

“I enjoy hearing your voice. Especially when you tell me about what Vere is like and what books you’ve been reading. Or when you ask me for a particular translation, or how to say something in Akielon because you’ve only ever read the words and never spoken them aloud. I like seeing you smile, and seeing how far away that is from the sad song I first heard you sing.”

“Damen.” Laurent whispers and Damen understands.

He lets go of both Laurent’s hands so he can slowly run them up Laurent’s arms. He keeps going further and further, up both sides of Laurent’s pale neck till he’s holding Laurent’s face between his hands. He looks between Laurent’s blue eyes for a moment, looking for any hesitation and finding none.

He angles Laurent’s head back just enough that he can lean in and connect their lips in the faintest of touches. Laurent’s lips are soft against his own, and he smells like sea salt and roses. His hair is feather soft as it brushes over his knuckles.

Laurent’s breath hitches against Damen’s lips and Damen can’t help it. He leans in again and all he can smell is roses.

~

When Damen finally manages to climb up the cliff side and make his careful way through the fields to the cottage it’s to find a lantern still lit in the window. It must be nearing one in the morning, and Damen feels guilty for having lost track of the time so much as to worry Helen or Stavos into staying up to see him get home.

He opens the front door, pulling his himation down from its hood as he slips inside and closes the door behind himself. When he turns around it’s to see both Helen and Stavos standing in the small kitchen and looking at him. Helen looks relieved but Stavos’ face is carefully blank.

“Damen, thank goodness.”

“Sorry _theítsa_ , I was down on the beach and I lost track of time.” He says quietly, letting her pull him into a hug. She holds on longer than she usually does though, and it makes him frown.

“ _Theíos?”_ He asks Stavos and Stavos gives him a stern look.

“You know how dangerous it is now for you to be out on your own like that, Damen. I expected the sneaking out and away to, if not stop, at least lower in occurrence not grow.” Helen finally lets go of the hug to step back and stand beside Stavos, but she’s biting her lip like she only does when she’s extremely worked up about something.

“Stavos I’m twenty-six. You’ve been training me with a sword, and with wrestling and fighting, since I was old enough to walk. I know I’m in more danger than most, but me going down to the beach – where no one ever is – isn’t going to kill me.”

“No. A beach isn’t going to kill you. But someone who finds you upon it might.” A new voice speaks and Damen flinches in surprise. Stavos steps to the side, and behind him is a man sitting at their dinner table. He stands and Damen notes that he’s not in battle leathers but he does have a bright red chlamys wrapped around his shoulders. He turns a startled glance to Stavos but Stavos isn’t looking at him, instead he’s turned to watch as the new man steps around the table to stand before Damianos.

“I—You think someone’s going to climb down those cliffs just to kill me on the beach?” Damen asks and the man regards him for a quiet moment.

“I think you’re going to have to be far more careful than you have been, Damianos, because at this very moment King Theomedes is sending fifty of his best soldiers and his son, Prince Kastor to come and kill you – wherever they may happen to stumble upon you. Be it a beach or at your Smith shop, or even on the street. It won’t matter to them.”

Damen’s mouth opens and closes as he wordlessly flounders. He tries to look over at Helen but she’s got her back to all of them, staring out the window into the darkness of the night beyond. He looks back at the man before him and has an abrupt moment of recognition.

“You… You were in the tavern, the night before the solstice.” He starts and the man gives a short nod of acknowledgement.

“And I’ve been watching you ever since. I was sent to kill you. Or capture you for the King to kill you.” He amends and Damen takes a careful step back. The man’s lips twitch.

“Trust me, if I genuinely wanted you dead you would be by now. But I decided to wait. The King has been... Not well in recent years, and though he might consider it treason for me to not necessarily go against a direct order but to delay it – well. I figured it would be better to form my own opinion of the danger you could put Akielos in before I killed a man who could potentially be innocent of the great machinations the King has decided to place upon your shoulders.”

“And what have you decided.” Damen asks wearily, watching as the man’s pale grey eyes flick about his person with careful consideration.

“I’ve decided to put some faith in the old gods and see whether the son of Egeria-Exalted will save or doom Akielos myself.”

“Who are you?” It’s barely a whisper, but the man in front of him hears it all the same.

The soldier in front of him straightens, one large arm falling down to his side so his hand rests on the hilt of the sword strapped to his side. “My name is Nikandros. I’m Captain of the Royal Guard.”

“The Royal Guard, doesn’t that mean you should be out protecting Kastor and Theomedes?” Damen tries, not sure of how to take this sudden turn of events but Nikandros isn’t deterred.

“I’m meant to protect all the royals, even from each other should need be. And that includes you.”

Damen opens his mouth to ask more questions but Nikandros turns to look at Stavos, who’s been standing there watching him the entire time he’s been speaking with Damen.

“We’ve got some work to do.” 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> im so sorry to leave this on a cliff hanger? but i did what i did last year again and bit off more than i could chew in the plot department? so this is getting a part two! it'll be four chapters, it'll be posted sometime later this month - not as part of the bang, but also not a sequel to this. it'll be a continuation. when im finished editing it and writing that last chapter i'll probably add it onto this and not post it as a second story. so keep an eye out!


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